


something bittersweet

by Cloudnine101



Category: Suicide Squad (2016)
Genre: First Kiss, M/M, Pining, how did i take this from the film, someone save me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-07
Updated: 2016-08-07
Packaged: 2018-08-07 06:53:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7704715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cloudnine101/pseuds/Cloudnine101
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rick can't stop coming back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	something bittersweet

Floyd goes to visit his daughter. It's a quiet day; they have lunch in a little restaurant booth and then walk around the park.

Rick makes sure that they can't spot him. He could hover over their shoulders, sure, but that wouldn't seem right. (He thinks about the kid he wants to have one day, and _knows_ it wouldn't be.) Floyd looks around a couple of times, but he doesn't say anything, and if Rick catches his eye once or twice they don't talk about it later.

 

 

 _Floyd Lawton. Deadshot, mercenary._ By now, the heft of his file is familiar to Rick's hands. He sits back in his bed with a glass of wine and reads about all the people he's killed. They're names without faces, and then numbers without names, and Rick's eyes are blurring when he kills the light, June's foot pressing up against his own.

(He dreams about Floyd's hand on his arm as he pulls him out, away from the explosives. He dreams about Floyd protecting him when he didn't have to - not really.)

 

 

June wants to be alone. That's what she says, as she's packing up her things. She needs some time to be by herself. Rick tries to tell her she isn't a danger, she won't hurt him, but he's wasting his breath. He knows that.

When she drives away, she waves at him like she's coming back. Rick smiles and smiles, and tried to pretend that she might be. He stands in the road until he can't hear her breathing in his head anymore.

 

 

"Flag," Floyd says. He lets the punch-bag drop. "You surprised me."

Rick shrugs. He's peering through the feeding hole. The guard to his left, Peterson, hefts her gun higher. Rick almost wants to ask her to _point that thing somewhere else_.

"I don't get a lot of visitors." Floyd's still not approaching him. He's standing just a few feet away. Rick wants to ask, _Why? Why?_ But the words are stuck in his throat.

"I destroyed the device," he said. "You could've just shot me and run. Why'd you come with me? Why'd you help June?"

Floyd smiles and it settles down somewhere in Rick's stomach. "I don't know."

"Bullshit." Rick pushes his face close, watches Floyd's eyes flicker up from his jaw. "What do you want, Deadshot? What's your game?"

Floyd's smile turns predatory. "Thought I was Floyd to you."

Rick shivers; he turns his back, and the guard pulls the flap across. Rick waits there for a while, keeping quiet, until he hears Floyd start to hit the bag again, _thunk-thunk._

 

 

"You're alone," Floyd says.

"You can't know that. There could be anyone behind me."

Floyd advances, quick; Rick's hand goes to his gun and his feet carry him back one step, two. Floyd smirks. "You're alone."

" _Alright._ I'm alone."

"You here to talk?"

"What else'd we do?"

Floyd's eyes draw level with his. "Play chess. Checkers. The piano."

Rick has a piano at home. It's by a window which overlooks the city. Rick used to play more often; now, it's mainly there for decoration, to impress people when they come around.

"Do you play?" Rick asks, and he thinks that they could play together: Floyd behind him, leaning over him to adjust his hands, chest pressing against Rick's back, lips skimming close to Rick's neck.

"Not really," Floyd says. "I'm more of a guitar kind of man."

Rick's disappointed and hates himself for it.

 

 

Floyd's second visit to his daughter and it's a gift, a gift Rick won't interfere with. "Why won't you let anybody else handle Deadshot?" his second-hand asked, once. He hadn't done it again.

Floyd's daughter holds his hand when they say goodbye on the steps. She's wearing a blue and white striped jumper, a present from Floyd himself. She whispers something to him, right in his ear, and when then Floyd smiles at _Rick_. (He draws himself back into the garden. He hides behind a wall until Floyd is taken safely back into the van. His hands are still shaking.)

 

 

"You _do_ play the piano," Rick insists. "Don't bother lying to me. I can see it!"

Floyd laughs. The mood's easy this afternoon. It's nice. Floyd's lounging against the door, and Rick's on the other side. One of his legs is aching. Somebody set up a fan for him. It's getting hot; it's coming towards the middle of the summer. Rick wonders, idly, whether he could get air con into Floyd's cell.

"Alright, alright, you got me. Grade six, no more." Floyd pauses. "How's everybody else?"

Rick's relaxed and warm. He's off his guard. He says, "What?"

"The Squad. Everybody. Thought you were going round checking on all of us."

Rick swallows. He feels, oddly enough, as though he's been caught lying. "I have," he says. "They're fine. Still alive."

"Cool," Floyd says, "that's good."

Rick decides not to tell him that Harley still gets shock-buzzed by the guards sometimes, that Captain Boomerang cries at night, that even Killer Croc doesn't sleep so easy anymore. Rick hasn't slept for a full night since June left.

"Grade six?" Rick says. "Impressive."

Floyd has retreated back inside. "Not really," he replies, and Rick's lost him.

 

 

When Rick drives in that morning, the heat's sweltering. He's stripped out of his jacket. Floyd must be roasting down there, he thinks, and gulps more of his water. As he's led downstairs, the temperature only increases. It's just this side of uncomfortable.

"I wouldn't hurt you, you know, if you came in here." Floyd's lying down; Rick can't see his face. He swallows, his hand coming to his forehead, pressing his hair down. It's a nervous gesture, one of his tells. "If you wanted to. I don't bite - not like Croc does."

Rick doesn't laugh. "You want me in there?"

Floyd's quiet for a second. "Wouldn't mind it."

"Maybe I will," Rick says, but he doesn't.

 

 

The dream always goes the same way. It's repetitive. Rick's standing outside he door to Floyd's cell. He's saying, "You want me in there?"

Floyd's sure, confident. "Yes."

Rick's hand is on the door. It pushes open easily, because it's a dream and so he doesn't need access codes or armed guards to follow him. Floyd's seated when he arrives but rises to greet him. The door closes behind him - Rick doesn't hear it but when he turns around it's shut.

"You here to talk?" Floyd asks him.

"What else'd we do?"

One of Floyd's hands is on his arm, the other's on his hip - only now they're running, they're under fire, and Rick knows that he has to tell him, it's his last chance - so he does, when they're sheltered underneath the burned-out husk of a car. "Floyd," Rick says, "I think I love you."

Floyd just looks at him - just looks. Then they're running again, only they can't find any cover, and they're hiding behind a wall and Floyd's pressing him to it and he's telling him _not to move_ and they're kissing, like they're frantic. 

Rick wakes feeling dirty, feeling as though he could fly.

 

 

"I want you to meet my daughter," Floyd says. Rick agreed to ride in the back of the truck it's him. Floyd's hands are bound; they're being taken towards his house. Every second Rick delays is a second they're getting closer. "You listening, Flag?"

"Yes," Rick blurts, "yeah, I'd - sure. Thanks."

 

 

Floyd's daughter, Rick's learned from the file, is called Zoe. She sorts her colouring crayons by size and stares at him like he's just fallen out of the sky. "Do you work with daddy?" she says. She's drinking orange juice and has a plate of biscuits in front of her which she hasn't touched.

"Kind of." When Floyd nods his head, Rick pulls out a chair and sits. "Your daddy works for me, technically, but we're more like - more like a team."

"He calls the shots and I take 'em." Rick's surprised Floyd can talk to his daughter about this so flippantly. Zoe only laughs, and Floyd looks pleased to have made her happy. "Eat up, baby, or Flag's gonna steal your cookies."

"That's right," Rick says, twisting to face him. Floyd is - not fond, but smiling. He can't be fond of him. They're allies, nothing else. They're certainly not _family_.

 

 

"Thanks for being so good with her," Floyd says, on the drive back.

"It was no trouble." Rick doesn't mention the drawing she shows him of her daddy and the people he's described - Harley Quinn and Killer Croc and Captain Boomerang, with Diablo going up in smoke. "She's a great kid."

Floyd smiles: "The very best."

 

 

Rick doesn't ask whether he can see Zoe again. He doesn't have to. Somehow, it becomes a routine of theirs. Zoe will pick a breakfast bar or a lunch club, and Floyd will tease her and prod her, and she'll call him out, and Rick will pay for everything even when Floyd protests, and they'll feed the ducks in the park.

"You're looking happy," Peterson says as she unlocks the door for their third Saturday running. "Got some colour in your cheeks, sir."

"I feel happy," Rick chuckles and flushes when he realises Floyd must have heard him.

 

 

Zoe's a smart girl. She's definitely going to get to Yale or Harvard or wherever - Rick's sure of it. Together with Floyd, he's going to make it happen for her, even if nobody else will. She doesn't like maths but she loves geography - loves the slopes of hills and mountains, the tourists pressed close, the pictures of hot springs in Iceland which he runs her fingers over. Rick's taken to cutting them out of magazines. They've started a scrap-book.

When Floyd leaves to go to the bathroom, Rick doesn't think twice about being alone with her.

"I really like it when you come out with me and daddy."

Rick's cheeks grow hot with pleasure. "That's - that's an honour, miss."

He expected Zoe to smile, but she doesn't. "Daddy told me that he loves you."

Rick stares.

"You make him feel safe," Zoe continues. "He wants to look after you."

And Floyd - looking after _him_ -

There's a creaking on the steps. How long had Floyd been standing there? How much had he heard?

"Wait," Rick calls, "wait!" He almost upends his chair in his haste to get out. Floyd's disappearing up the stairs, but he stops when he sees he's been caught. "Floyd."

"Rick." It's the first time Rick's heard Floyd say his name. Floyd isn't looking at him. His jaw's working. "Truth's out now, huh. Never thought I'd come from her. Thought I'd be the wrong to slip up."

"Slip up - ?" Rick runs his hand through his hair. "What're you saying?"

"You heard what she said, right?"

"I did. But - "

"But you're horrified. Sure. I get that. I'm a killer, you're a solider. No way anything good could come out of this. I'm a textbook sociopath."

"I never said that. I never said that." But Floyd isn't going to believe him, so Rick does what he can and grabs his arm, forces Floyd to look at him. "You've done bad things, but you're not - I don't think of you that way."

"How do you think of me?"

Rick peers up at him, chin tilted. He's still a step below. "You really gotta ask that, Lawton?"

Floyd's hands, shaking, come to rest on his shoulders. Rick can't take it; he presses closer and Floyd kisses him. Rick wraps both arms around his waist. There's that humming again, the humming that reminds him of Floyd, a buzzing in his chest and arms and legs that lifts him. Floyd's tongue dips into his mouth, just once, but it's enough to make Rick gasp against him. When it breaks, Rick gulps for air.

"This is a whole new level of trouble," Floyd says, "for the both of us. Sure you're ready?"

Rick takes his hand, and he wasn't expecting Floyd to laugh. "I'll take my chances," he says.

 

 

"Like _Hell_ you were checking up on everyone." Apparently, Floyd won't quit. "Acts like he cares about the Squad, when he really just wants - "

"Daddy?" Zoe says, and they spring apart, shame-faced. "What are you doing up there?"

(Rick doesn't know how to reply. He lets Floyd do the talking.) 

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! you can find me @muckymagician on tumblr


End file.
